


Stoners Seeking Ghost

by Smuppetsona (CarcharodonOrcinus)



Category: Homestuck
Genre: M/M, ghost summoning, pot brownies, stoners/bad decisions
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-03-14
Updated: 2017-04-15
Packaged: 2018-10-05 05:54:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 2,648
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10299095
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CarcharodonOrcinus/pseuds/Smuppetsona
Summary: College roomies John and Dirk decide to bond together over pot brownies and ghost summoning. They were very much warned about summonings.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> i'm intending all the chapters to be very short sweet and to the point, and to add up to a larger narrative. i may alter the summary and tags as the fic grows naturally.

“Dude, I should not have had two brownies; bad idea, me,” he practically shouts as he lies on his bed, legs swung over the side. You’re beside him, back against the wall, and there’s a small tin with a few leftover brownies inside and a loving note from Jane. 

You only had one, but you’re not nearly the size John is, so it’s hitting you pretty hard. You are filled with the sense that time is meaningless, a rushing stream parting around you like the rock parts the river, and that you should be doing  _ something _ with your newfound ability to glimpse into time itself.

“I know where Rose keeps her spellbooks. I might could steal one and we could summon a ghost.”

John shoots up at the word  _ ghost _ like he’s been possessed.

“I love ghosts, let's get a ghost!”

He is rocketing around you; he has his shoes half-on and is hobbling out the door while you watch him fumble towards the outside world. He’s never this fast. You briefly consider that actually he’s going slow, and you’re thinking slower, but the thought is lost quickly in the stream of your consciousness to other, more important thoughts.

“One man heist, bro. You just keep watch.”

Grumbling and crossing his arms, he steps back from the door while you get your bearings straight. However, your bearings are very reflective of yourself and refuse to straighten. You fall flat on your ass while slipping on a shoe.

Giggling, John ribs you, “You sure you can pull a heist? This is Rose here, she’s not gonna let you stumble into her secret evil magic supply.”

Dick.

“I know what I’m doing. Toss me my other shoe.”

Somehow, you both make it to Rose’s dorm alive and unscathed.

“Go stand at the end of the hall and keep watch for her.”

He snaps to attention for a quick salute and says, “Aye, aye, captain!” before marching down the hall and slumping against the wall. Even stoned out of his mind, he makes time for pointless theatrics. Truly a man after your own heart.

With John out of the way, you execute your master plan.

With three quick raps on the the door, you ask, “Rose, you in there? I need to summon a ghost.”

The door cracks open and your cousin peers out at you.

“Why would you ‘need’ to summon a ghost?”

“I’m helping John lose his v-card; he told me in complete confidence that he can only get horny for the spectral touch of a ghost blow job. And ectoplasm.”

“A worthy cause,” she says, slamming the door in your face. You can hear her shuffling around, slamming even more shit around before returning to the door. Once again, she cracks it open and slips you a large, black, leather-bound tome.

“I’ve bookmarked a few ideal chapters. But be warned, Dirk: You are delving into the unknown. The waters of the undead are deep, too deep for light to penetrate, and you may lose not only John’s v-card, but yourselves. Be wary of--”

“I’m good on the lecture now.”

“If you die, don’t blame me.” She slams the door in your face a second time.

You sneak back to John’s position, the book in hand, and whack him hard on the shoulder with it. The weight of it is incredible.

“HOLY FUCK!” he screams in astonishment. Hand over heart, he scowls at you and says, “Do you want Rose to know we stole her book?!”

“No one will ever know I was in there, John. My presence was the flicker of the shadow on the wall, a glimpse of motion out the corner of your eye before you tell yourself you’ve been up too long. Ain’t a soul who can pin a thing on Dirk Strider. Now let’s go get you some ghosts.”

You return to your dorm with John and your heisted spoils. An adventure awaits you, and you are psyched about these fuckin’ ghosts.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> She told them, bro. Rose warned them.

The tome rests on your desk, the sheer weight of it unbalancing the cheap furniture.

“You ready to see some sexy specters?”

Your hands are splayed outside the open book, your chest hovering above the spectral summoning spell.

“Only the sexiest specters, dude,” he answers beside you. He’s turned towards your bed, readying the offering.

“The sigil’s drawn?”

He centers a sheet of paper with a symbol reminiscent of a figure eight with creeping tendrils spiraling out in waving lines drawn in black sharpie between your offerings. The ink ran in tiny streams in the fibers, creating a fuzzy halo of tiny fractals.

“Yup!”

“Offerings all set?”

He mutters to himself, “Left-over lo mein, pot brownie, sweaty sock...Yeah, we’re good to go!”

You cross your fingers that something tentacular, something excreted bodily, and something inebriating will suffice for whetting the appetite of whatever hot ghosts are in your area and you return to your borrowed text.

Luckily for you, the incantation is in latin, which you study, so you know how to pronounce it. Unluckily, you only have about 50% comprehension of a text this level, so you have no idea what the fuck is coming out of your mouth. This could be anything, even a poem about the might of the noble horse cock. The only thing you really know is that it deserves to be laid out with rhythm.

You tap your foot and bob your head to keep time, letting the incantation spill out of you in a natural flow. The force of it seems to swell inside you, and you cannot look away from the spellbook. You can only keep on the course, but you never intended to quit.

_Tap, tap, tap._

The desk is wobbling beneath you--your weight keeps shifting from side to side, and your hands are pressed so hard into it the tips of your fingers are turning white. They feel like they could be part of it now.

Your eyes won’t focus, but the incantation is still pouring out of you like flooding after a dam breaks. You still don’t want to stop.

But there is a thudding in your chest that you want to tear out. It’s making you dizzy and delirious; this drum inside you is off-beat with the tapping of your foot and it’s going to trip you up, and what will happen then?

You’ll look like a fool. An incompetent fool who can’t even read a simple passage. Everyone would know what a wreck you really are; your illusion of control would lie in ruins. You can’t quit, not now, not now that there’s so much staked on your success. You can’t fail.

You want to rip it to pieces, that off-beat drum, before it destroys you; you want to shred up the pages for daring to taunt you, the desk supporting your imminent humiliation, everything around you; you want to become a bladed hurricane, a roaring storm of destruction on a warpath through your life, a wildfire tearing--

”DIRK!”, comes a shout beside you, cutting through the cacophony in your head. His hand is on your shoulder. The rocking of the desk stops. The sea itself parts.

“Come back to us mortals, we’ve got something here!”

He pulls you to face the bed.

“What the hell is _that,_ ” you mutter.

A black _shape_ has emerged from what used to be the sigil. Tendrils writhing and dripping ink, it gives birth to itself. It shudders with whimpering sobs that you aren't hearing with your ears.

It’s misery to behold. You can only watch it squirm as it wraps a slimy appendage around a lo mein noodle, pulls it towards itself, and begins to shriek.

“I’M STARTING TO THINK THIS WAS A BAD IDEA,” John yells, barely breaking through the ear-splitting cry of this monster in your bed. You used to sleep in that bed. Oh how you’ll grieve for that simpler time.

“I THINK I CAN FIX THIS. JUST FOLLOW MY LEAD.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> you may have noticed that this chapter is also 666 words. what a coinkidink.


	3. Chapter 3

“DON’T TOUCH IT!” John yells, his voice barely audible over the continued wailing.

“I’M JUST PICKIN’ UP THE PAPER IT’S COMIN’ THROUGH.” The psychic resonance drowns out your own voice entirely.

You keep plucking at the corner of what is now a portal for an abomination that you cannot name, but the tendrils whip almost as fast as you do, and you have to pull back over and over.

“I’M JUST GONNA DIVE FOR IT.”

“WHAT?! NO--”

And do you ever. Like lightning, you snap right for it.

Miraculously, it doesn’t even glance you, and you pinch the page right at the corner. You pull back to rip it from your bed as fast as you went in.

But it doesn’t budge.

Instead, the room goes still. Silent.

Black tentacles encircle and snare your arm as a wall of flesh tackles you to the ground. They snap back with a hiss. It warbles and pulses and leaves you alone.

“I said don’t touch it, Dirk!”

Your sunglasses have been knocked askew, and he’s looking you in the eye with concern and worry etched into his face while you lie there shields-down. 

You’re speechless, but he doesn’t seem to care. He reaches out for your arm.

“ _ Jeez _ , that had to hurt!”

Well, now that he mentions it, there is indeed a distinct burning where the tentacles once were, and red welts were already raising. 

“It looks like angry spaghetti,” he says, gingerly prodding your wrist.

You stone your face, but John still seems to notice your masked wince.

He shifts his weight off of you and opens his mouth, but before he can speak, he’s interrupted by the mass behind you bellowing and flailing about, slinging noodles and slime all over the room. Something has tipped in its favor. It pulses like a heart, growing larger with every beat. The depth of its new baritone howling echoes in your head.

Pushing him the rest of the way off, you roll under the bed and snatch your katana from its hiding space in your bed frame. You have to end this now.

“Why do you have that?! Oh, no, don’t stab it! Shit,” John protested.

But you just slice through it. Once again, it shrieks as its severed tendrils fly away from it like dandelion seeds in a hurricane. With a chorus of splattering, they rain down on the carpet and the walls, staining everything they touch in shadow.

The echoing fades, its writhing mass shrinks back, and it whimpers softly.

“Oh. I guess that worked then?”

Smugly you rest your sword on your shoulder.

“Of course it did. Now how the hell are we going to get rid of it?”

“Maybe we should call Rose.”

_ AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII!,  _ it screeches, forcing you both to reflexively cover your ears to no avail.  The loose tendrils are no longer on the ground.

You jump in front of John and parry the dark missiles as they whistle through the air, hellbent on piercing through the two of you. Instead, they find themselves lodged in the walls.

“That’s it, we need her!”

“We don’t.”

“We do!!!”

He whips out his phone and calls her while you circle him, blocking the tendrils from reaching your defenseless roommate. 

“Hi, Rose!”  _ Clang. _ “Nah, that’s just Dirk.”  _ Squish _ . “You could say that, sure, but I wouldn’t say that.”  _ Shing. _ “We  _ maaaay _ have stolen a spellbook from you.”  _ Splish _ . “What do you mean you know?”  _ Ding. _ “UUUUGH, Rose, that is not cool!”  _ Ting. _ “I don’t have time for this; just tell me how to fix it or send it back or whatever!”  _ Shlop. _ “Uh-huh, okay, alright… Like with a lighter or..?”  _ Blorck. _ “Alright, alright,  _ jeez! _ Next time, give us a normal ghost and this won’t happen!”

He hangs up and saunters his sweet ass over to the dresser while you keep playing defense tower for him. He pulls out a lighter and a couple of ancient newspapers.

“I’ve got this, now, dude.”

He flicks the flame to life.


	4. Chapter 4

The flame of the lighter flickers in his hand, and the severed tendrils stop in their tracks. The black mass shrieks again, a wailing alarm softening to whimpers. And John stands there like an idiot.  
“So… Are you making a torch?”  
Newspapers still bundled in one hand, distinctly in a non-torch and very stack-like shape, he nods.  
“Shouldn’t you have rolled them before lighting the lighter?”  
“Uhhh, hindsight is 20-20?”  
You snatch the papers out of his hand and push him in front of you.  
“You’re the fucking defense tower, now.”  
The tendrils flee, dropping to the floor and slinking to cool shadows. The mass which spawned them cowers from its portal, unable to move. The whimpering is so, so quiet now, like it's trying to stifle its own cries. It's pathetic to behold.  
You roll your torch.  
“Light it,” you demand, shoving it in John’s face. The grander implications of what you must do are tying your stomach in knots.  
"Are you sure?"  
You aren't looking at him. You refuse to look at anything, choosing to stare into middle-distance instead. Like the waves from a pebble dropped in a pond, the whimpering laps weakly at the edges of your mind. Can he even still hear it?  
"We have to."  
You have to. Whatever this is, you made it. You could feel it being born from something inside you, and now you're going to do what? Kill it? Have you created just to destroy?  
He holds your shoulder again, and takes the torch from you.  
"I've got this, don't worry," he reassures you.  
Your head is splitting.  
Click, and the lighter bursts your shoddy torch into flames, the slow flicker reflecting on your shades. Another shriek, shrill and frightened. It quivers in your periphery.   
John, in a voice not unlike a pissed-off kindergarten teacher, speaks to the creature occupying your bed.  
"You have to back through your portal now!"  
It whines like a frightened dog.  
"Nope! Look at what you did," he says, flourishing his empty hand towards your half-demolished dorm room. A noodle drops from the ceiling with a nasty splap.   
"It's totally wrecked in here! Get back in your portal. Don't make me use this!" Waving the torch in front of it, he scowls as it shakes and flattens into the bed.  
"John, it ain't a portal."   
"Huh?" he says astutely.  
"I made him. I didn't wear my dark majicks condom, and I accidentally made a baby monster. It really just goes to show the importance of practicing safe magic."  
"Dude, what are you talking about?"

"We can't push it back in; it's growin' out of the paper. You'll just burn it to death."  
Pulling the torch away, he turns to the monster you have made and asks it, "Is that true? Were you born today?"  
Buuh oo b'uhn d'deih? it mimics. Its voice is squeaky, but there's a deep echo beneath, like its speaking many ways at once.  
"D'awww, you're right, he's just a scary baby," John coos, waggling his finger at it, having clearly forgotten that you have a set of nasty welts on your arm now from touching it a couple minutes ago.  
Then he confronts you, "You need to apologize to our baby!"   
"I'm nobody's dad."  
"We made him, that makes us his dads!" He grabs you by the arm and pulls. "Now say sorry for hurting him."  
"I'm...sorry. Yea." John nudges you with his elbow straight to your side. "For choppin' up your tentacles. Didn't realize you were a baby."  
"Our baby," he corrects. "Guess we don't need this!"  
He opens the window and tosses the still-burning torch outside. You cross your fingers for rain, because you can't hear over the excited, terrible, squelching, squealing cacophony your monster is making.  
"LOOK HOW HAPPY HE IS!" John shouts.  
The little severed tentacles swarm back to the body. Whatever this is, you can't win.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Its only been a million years

**Author's Note:**

> honestly? i'm not a fan of pot brownies. they taste rank. can't eat 'em.


End file.
